2020-01-14 Game Management Advisory Commission Minutes

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Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 14, 2020 cute little trails – put some signs up but we have no money to do – keep the invasive grasses under control. The mamane can’t reproduce under these conditions – I can take, you know, I’d be more than willing to take people up and show ‘em, you know, baby mamane. It’s not in the big grass – it’s up on the sides where there’s hardly any vegetation, next to the sheep trail, next to the sheep droppings, little mamanes not being nibbled on, you know, if animals are doing something it’s cause out of desperation, drought, water, you know, lack of food, you know, take the fences off around the waters – let these animals get some water – manage the herds – they won’t touch that stuff. It’s just like the pigs and people. You know, people aren’t going to eat crap unless they’re starving to death and God knows they’re boiling shoe leather and eating it. And it’s the same with these animals, you know, we’ve got a situation, you know, the fire hazards – fire breaks are not gonna do any good – we’ve got tremendous winds, California is a classic example of why we need to do something now. If we had fire breaks and everything – 40mph you can have a 50 foot fire break and it’s not gonna do anything. And if you get fire break – you’re losing 100% of natural forest and lands for fire break that may work – that has to be moved and everything else and the Department knows about it cause they’re got massive road \[unclear\] they mow everything around mitigation area. I don’t even hunt the mitigation area anymore cause there’s no birds. I have seen a bird – when I first hunted there we would go in there and get birds. I go don’t – I go in once a year just to make a look to make sure that there are no birds and there are no pigs. And I don’t’ hunt pigs on Mauna Kea cause it’s the only animal up there that’s knocking the grass down – making trails for the game birds to travel – rugging up the ground so the birds actually have places. We can have everything – there’s no reason we can’t have game birds, sheep, pigs, goats, sandalwood – and the reason there’s no sandalwood is people – it’s not the pigs – the pigs came on the first canoe – it was people that wiped out the sandalwood – the people that wiped out the koas – the people that wiped out the trees – it’s not invasive animals. NP: Good point, yeah... BL: You know, we can have everything and as far as the birds go, you know, it’s a bad year and a lot of it’s the vegetation. I know so many people that are just avid hunters that aren’t even hunting on Mauna Kea cause the grass is too thick – they’re scared – you know a lot of these people are older people they can’t walk in that grass. They’re falling, they’re breaking. I have one friend that has got cracked ribs cause he fell on Mauna Kea. I’ve got another friend who just hunts Puuwaawaa. He gets a few blacks cause he can’t walk that stuff. You know it’s just, you know this is my impersonation of the thing that’s it’s just – it’s been a bad year, but I’m still going and we’ll go tomorrow and we’re going to put in some serious miles looking for birds cause that’s what I enjoy doing and I’ve got the dog and it’s just, you know, it’s sad cause at the check in station people used to get that one hill below that first stand of trees 30